Total lunar eclipse 6am

I woke up 30 minutes earlier than normal to see the total lunar eclipse this morning.  It was only viewable for people on the west coast and I think they said it was the last one viewable from the west coast in our lifetime. 

I stumbled over Loo and out the door, down the dark hallway and opened the door at the end.  On the other side of the door was our cat Murrs who was 'murring' loudly and trying to slip through the open door, but I closed the door before she could slip in and I stepped over her while she walked circles around my feet to get to the front door. 

It looked cold and dark outside.  It was then that I realized I forgot my shoes.  I thought about going back to get shoes and missing the total lunar eclipse, the last one in my lifetime.  I walked outside bare foot. 

The brick walkway was icy and it took me a bit of time to scan the horizon to find the moon.  I heard owls hooting in the palm trees in front of the house and when I approached to see the moon an owl leapt off the top of the tree and glided into the field behind our house.  Jerry Bruckheimer's field. 

And there, for all to see was the moon, half of which was red and clearly visible in the early morning sky.  Ideally I would have viewed it for some time to watch it change, but my feet were frozen and I was cold because I was wearing my PJs.  I walked back inside and decided to make a fire and coffee.  Now I have my coffee on my left, the fire at my back and my kitty on my right. 

This is a good way to start a Saturday morning before work.

One month has gone by and a lot has happened.

This time I mean it though. A lot has happened, life changing changes ahead.

I have been stupid-busy with work.  A bunch of people quit, were transferred, or started school.  As the only non student there I had to pick up the slack.  I had back to back 13 hour days giving me more than 40 hours a week, a lot more.  At first I didn't mind it, I zoned out and let my body do the job as my mind wandered to the stories and characters I will write about later, when I have time, when I'm not completely fried to the bone.  Tengo el cerebro frito.  But the part that was bad was coming home exhausted.  I didn't want to do anything.  Eat, sleep, repeat, that was me.  It was pretty shitty for Loo because I was so grouchy and burned out.  She wanted to do SOMETHING, anything and I was like NO!  And finally I relented and went to a bar with her friends.  I was nodding off in the middle and could barely stay awake.  Working all the time was tough on the two of us.

But the money was good, too good apparently.

On august 29th the lease was up at the place I was staying at with my two coworkers.  One of them I like the other I do not.  When it came to sign up again I was an emphatic NO.  I started looking at new places to live with Loo to get her out of her family's house.  I found places for cheap that were nice but I didn't like the idea of facing another Michigan winter.  Or any Michigan winters for that matter.  I started wondering what I was doing out here and why I had come and when I would go back.

Loo recently graduated with a degree in accounting and was ravenously looking for a job.  All day that I worked she was applying, searching and filling out applications for jobs all over. But she wasn't having much luck.  Seems like they want people with experience and don't want to pay them for it and don't want to give experience either.  I asked my uncle what to do (he is an accountant and lives back in Cali)  He said that Loo needed to be in California if she wanted to be an accountant.  There were more people and more jobs.  She started looking for jobs in California.

There were hundreds and they paid better.  Starting pay was often more than three times what I make.

She started applying there too.

Long story short we are coming home to Cali.  I want to tell you I am excited, but it seems naive to say that, or maybe temporary.  No, the feeling I have is a deeper general happiness. 

We were going to leave a week ago, but Loo checked with the University of Michigan's Migraine pain clinic (best in the country, 2 year wait for an appointment is normal, she had been on the list for a year already and had an appt for next November) and they had a cancellation on the 21st. 

That is our departure date.  Our cars are packed and we are taking all our stuff including all my books (whew!) our two rats Swiper and Shredder, and our Savannah monitor lizard Bup and his new big cage, which he hasn't used yet. It looks funny on the roof of my car.

I strapped it to the roof of my car with two ratcheting tie straps and we filled it with bulky and light weight items.  Funny story about that.  EVERYONE seems to have an opinion about how it should be strapped down and it isn't the way that I did it.  Loo's mom wants me to strap a third strap running from the front of the car to the back across the windshield and back window and rear wing.  There wasn't anything to hook it to, but that didn't seem to matter so long as it was hooked.

got to go, see ya soon!

when animals fight

I see animals fight everyday.
They fight and yell for territory and revenge
for sex and resources,
they show their teeth, they snarl and they puff up
to look bigger than they really are
to scare the other away and avoid a fight.
It usually works.
This is the way of the noble animal
the human
The Homo Sapiens
the "Wise man"
the "Thinking man"
though I struggle to see the noble part
I see I am a thinking animal.


Where did that come from? It burned in my mind. Needed to be written, needed to be free. It brings with it some thoughts.

Recently, within the last year or so, I have started seeing humans as animals. When they do things I see the instant similarities between gorilla and chimpanzee. Sometimes with sex, on tv or in real life, I see this animal interaction. The sex face of pain/pleasure identical on a Lion or a Mountain Goat or a moose or a porcupine or a human. Sometimes I feel like I am an animal doing animal things like marking territory not with urine but with pictures and prosody. And I see everyone else doing animal things as well. It can make it difficult to talk to people that think they are better than or above animals, something distinct. When somebody yells and challenges another I see a chimp on a rock slapping its hands down hooting a threat. And when others commend the bravery of these individuals and remark about their sophistication I can barely keep my mouth closed. I want to tell them they are animals.

Sometimes with violence and fighting in movies or real life I see the struggle of animals. Chimps and Gorillas fight one another like we do, minus the guns and stuff. When I see humans fighting the idea of the noble animal or the wise man melts away and I see the savage brutality that is primate aggression, that is us. Its like watching a nature show.

The face with its numerous muscles (52?) expresses some universal faces like pain, fear and aggression in dogs, in cats, in us. When I see a guy get punched and wince in pain I see a multitude of animals in pain, a universal expression of pain. Even when stories talk about people fighting I can't help put envision primitive people hooting and hollering around one another throwing stones and sticks wrestling to the ground kicking and biting until someone dies. That hasn't really changed, except for the weapons which keep improving to kill better and better.

But there is a lot more to it than that.

But I will have to tell you about it later.

Deadly

There is a show called deadliest warrior where they test weapons and armor with fancy technology and science. They use ballistic gel which simulates the density and viscosity of human flesh. Here is a bullet piercing the gel and showing hydrostatic shock.



They also use animal carcasses like sides of beef and torsos of pig which also simulate human tissue. Than they use weapons from the ancient and modern world of war on these items to see what they can do. This interests me but not Loo, so I watch it by myself. In season two they started filling the test items, ballistic gel, and animal carcasses with bags of presumably fake blood. When a weapon hits they bleed, which is useful to judge from afar how lethal a weapon is. However as time goes on and more shows get made the blood and gore increases and becomes sensational. I don't really like that. But at the same time, after awhile, I do. What I like most about the show is seeing these weapons from all over the world. There was this Maori weapon called a 'Mere' which is a flat club made of Jade.

It didn't look dangerous at all because it had no sharp edge. But he broke a cow's skull in half with it. A cow's skull is twice the thickness of our own, which is just crazy from a hand-held weapon. Oh I should talk about the Maori here. This is from memory:

The Maori (Mow-ree) are a group of Polynesians that traveled to New Zealand around 1300 CE. Form there, in isolation, they developed their own language and culture and were considered the last 'pure' native group having lived in seclusion until around 1800 when Europeans started showing up. It is from the Maori that the world got tattoos. Captain Cook's crew drew pictures of the natives facial tattoos and brought them back to England. The Maori also practiced cannibalism which is not unique among humans. Humans all over the world tend to think the body has power and when an enemy is bested you gain his power by eating him. If he was courageous you might eat his heart, strong you might eat his muscles, fast his legs, etc. Anyway, the Maori fought against the Europeans who had Gun Powder and muskets and scared them out of New Zealand. Maori are tough dudes.

Where was I? Oh yeah, the weapons from all over the world interest me a lot. The Deadliest Warrior show did a comparison once with Pirate vs Knight. And I thought for sure the knight would not stand a chance because the Pirate had gun powder. But when they put a ballistic gel torso on a stand and put the knight's steel breast plate on it and had a pirate guy fire the flintlock pistol at it the lead ball bounced of the breastplate harmlessly.

There was a very famous episode we talked about in my Japanese Film and Visual Culture class where they had the epic match up of Viking vs. Samurai. It is so culturally charged. The Vikings are huge white guys wielding steel weapons with brute strength. The Samurai are small Asians wielding weapons of perfect quality used with skill and speed. Who will win? (neither of those two statements are accurate btw because both are GIANT stereotypes)

Because of WWII there is a competetive culture war going on between America and Japan and you see it in our movies and our games and our news stories. The Japanese are ninja warriors, faster than light, move without sound, with martial arts training, a serious honor code and a fearless reputation. All of this depicts the Japanese as ninja super men, better than Americans, able to take on huge groups of people and emerge victorious, due to martial training and dedication, they are depicted as being capable of everything, everything except being human. Which makes it easy to fight them in war. An enemy that is like you is hard to kill. I'm jumping around a lot. Point is that episode of deadliest warrior only fed this erroneous idea. Contrary to popular opinion the Japanese are very human with idiots and jerks among them just like us.

Sidenote: WWII propaganda worked for both the Americans and Japanese. The Japanese were told by their government that the Americans were savages, you are better than them, and not to surrender to them because they would cut you up and do unspeakable things to you. The Americans were told a similar thing. They were both told this because humans are scared of that.

When they met each other on the battlefield they fought tenaciously. The Japanese soldiers didn't want to get chopped up or tortured. And the Americans didn't either. After the fight the Americans were victorious and started cutting off the ears, eyes, fingers, toes and teeth of the Japanese as trophies and started hanging them around their necks. The other Japanese saw the Americans do this, forever cementing the propaganda they had been told as truth. Now the Americans had seen similar things done to their guys. So both people did the same thing. I'm not sure who started it first, but it doesn't really matter. What you hear in our stories is how the Japanese did that to our guys. The Japanese were savages. We had to beat them. The fact that we did it back or even did it first isn't mentioned. What matters is they BOTH did it because they believed their propaganda. Its also important to see beyond culture and realize that humans are capable of some nasty things regardless of culture.

It's weird. like, I am aware of violence. When I see it in a movie I often react negatively, like I don't like it. I wonder if it was necessary to show that for the sake of the story. Might there be a way to convey that info without violence? Sometimes violence bothers me and sometimes it doesn't and I like it. Though I think that is human and depends on context. Like imagine the movie The Count of Monte Cristo. Imagine you skip ahead to the final fight and you see this savage sword battle between two people. It is hard to watch, the violence is high. You don't know who will win, or how, or why they are fighting. Its only with context that you understand why they are fighting, that the bad guy ruined the good guy's life and tried to take everything he held dear and now after all that horror the good guy is going to get him back, REVENGE! Revenge is soooo human. We get it, and because we do some of the most violent images can be shown and we can watch and feel justified in doing so.

Axle number 3

Political topic sprang into my head, an uncaused cause.

You know the tea party movement? Listen to this:

http://youtu.be/An6CeNRCBvo

It's like the shift from top dog to equals that really bothers them. I imagine that is why there are so few minorities within the tea party movement. This must also be why that when they come on TV they are white, christian, republican, conservatives that write signs and spell poorly and chant about Obama being a Kenyan spy or some such.

Somebody asked me to consider the tea party movement for a moment, to give it a chance, to stop being so close minded.

It's like, guess what, if your position is crazy I dont have to try it on for size or give it a test run. I can look at it and say, "That looks crazy, so, no thank you." And the tea party people should accept that.

I have this crazy idea that political movements or other life practices should stand on their own principals. And by that virtue alone should they be considered good or bad.

new topic: Loo's car broke it's axle AGAIN. So I ordered axle number three because they were fresh out. The first axles went bad about a month after installation. They started to wobble under acceleration. So when you gave it gas it would shake the steering wheel like the car was coming apart. Once I found the problem I replaced the axles with set two of Autozone Chinese-slave-labor-specials. They have a lifetime warranty so I keep getting new ones for free. It would be nice if I didn't have to, like they could make a quality product, but apparently we don't have time for rational solutions.

Shortly after I installed axle set number two the transmission started leaking transmission fluid. I undid the work I had done before to get a look at the problem. The transmission seals had gone bad and did not seal anymore. Back story: her transmission died a while back and I replaced it with a certified used one from a giant auto wrecker online. The seals in that new-to-us trans were on their way out. I didn't think to replace them at the time. Anyway I called up my brother, lord of car knowledge, and asked him what I should do. He said that Autozone was worse than Pepboys, which is pretty bad, and I should get parts from Kragen/Oreilly's or the deal, which was closed that day.

I went to Autozone and saw a woman behind the counter. Now, I am usually very good about not being sexist, or prejudicial, but when women work at auto parts stores they usually, in my experience, know very little about cars, and it is difficult to be objective on account of the failure rate I have experienced. Of the ten women behind the counter I have got parts from only one of them knew her stuff, and knew more than I did. The others can, with my assistance, look up my car, show me a picture of the part and ask me if that looks right before walking off to match the numbers up. That's what this lady did.

The part she brought back looked far too large to be correct.

"Are you sure this is the right part?" I asked.
"Absolutely," she said, "Transmission axle seals."
"They look too big to me."
"Oh, that's the right part."
"Will you check the axle hub seal part number and make sure these aren't them?"
"Sure, lets see, nope, same part number, same part inner and outer. Can't go wrong."

Here she asked the manager about it to double check her work. I was causing doubt. He said she was right. I wasn't convinced, but I had no evidence.

"Hmm... Ok, well, if this doesn't work I can exchange for the right one, yeah?"
"Yep!" Came her chipper response.
"Alright, thank you," I said before buying 70 bucks worth of transmission seals.

Than I went home, removed the axles and used a wrench to pry the old seals out because they fit so tightly. When the old seals came out I compared it to the new seals. It fit inside the new part and passed through it.

"Wrong fucking part," I said to myself. I got up, put the tools away, cleaned my hands and drove over there in the Green Machine ( a 96 Pontiac grand prix with 211k miles). I brought the old bad part with me so I could show them as well as compare it to the new part they would give me in the store.

"You gave me the wrong part," I said placing the parts, old and new, as well as the receipt on the counter. Having worked in the customer service industry (tires) for almost eight years I knew all the tricks. I have been on the receiving end of customer ire and there aren't that many forms it can take, but it causes a certain kind of action to take place. 'Shit gets taken care of,' as they say. Besides I was angry for having to come back. If they had given me the right part I wouldn't be there. That meant that super-polite me and wrathful me met somewhere in the middle to be stern me.

I didn't want an apology because it would be hollow and well-faked after being rattled off so often, but I wanted them to acknowledge their mistake and take action in the future to prevent this. Anyway, this new guy picked up both parts and examined them for about a minute before proclaiming that I was in fact correct in my original assessment. Than the woman from four hours ago saw me and stood silently at the new guy's shoulder watching his screen.

"Did I give you the wrong part?" She asked.
"Yes," I said.
"I'm so sorry!" She said.

I would have thought she meant it had she not worn the fake sincerity face. It's a face I know well, a face I use often at work. If you don't work in customer service and don't know this face you can recognize it by the extra long time it takes to blink the eyes. The best fake sincerity faces slowly open their eyes at the last word of what they say so they don't have to look you in the eye when they lie.

The most jaded of us can look you right in the eye and show you how much we care. It satisfies all subconscious queues, and its undetectable even to veterans of the industry except in one area: it is too clean, too perfect, exactly the right amount of words in the right order. And beneath that mask there is nothing resembling sincerity. A genuinely sincere person expresses sincerity with whatever words they can, often repeating words or using words like gosh, oh no, that's horrible, I had no idea, and many others.

Of course the customer has a role to play as well. They don't believe that we deliberately fooled them, but they insist on an apology almost every time as though we did. This causes us to apologize all the time for stuff we have no control over. We both know this, but the charade continues. This conditioning bleeds into my life and I often apologize to Loo for stuff that I'm not responsible for. And she corrects me.

Where was I?

Oh yeah she apologized.
"It happens," I said. My typical response.
"you know what happened?" she asked me. I didn't really care what happened. I wanted to fix Loos's car and get back to my day off. Did I mention I was annoyed to have to come back there? "I clicked the wrong part and compared it to the wrong part and told you it was the right one." She said with a shrug, meaning perhaps it was a simple mistake that could happen to anyone. I still wasn't interested. But she seemed desperate for forgiveness. I felt like if I forgave her she wouldn't change, and I didn't want to give her a lesson about finding parts that she would have to listen to because the customer is always right and then disregard after I left. So I said nothing, let her imagination fill in the blanks. When customers do that to me when I make a mistake (I rarely make mistakes at work) it helps me to be better. I am scarred by the sting of my incompetence.

I like that last sentence.

Anyway the mood in O'reilly's dropped down a bit and everyone worked toward solving my problem. They grabbed the correct part, of which there were two different part numbers. One for the left and one for the right side. They were slightly different sizes. Anyway I thanked them (why did I do that?) and went home. With the right parts for the job now I finished in a few hours in time for dinner. I think. I can't remember.

After fixing the seals and the leak I needed to fill the transmission back up. Loo came down to check on me at this point.

"Whatcha doin?" she asked.
"Adding trans fluid," I said.
"How do you know how much to add?"
"I don't," I said, "I got to kind of eye-ball it."
"Do you need a funnel?"
"If you have one."
"Let me look. Hey, thanks for fixing my car."
"yeah."
"I can't find a funnel. Do you need me to get you one?"
"No, I know a trick," I said. I was actually kind of excited to use the trick which I had only ever heard of but never seen or tried myself.

I pulled the trans dipstick up 90% of the way out and poured the trans fluid into the dipstick. The red fluid stuck to the dipstick and slid right down the tube.

"whoa, cool!" Loo said, "Why's it do that?"
"Capillary action," I said.
"What's that?"
"The molecules hold together so well that they pull themselves together and stick to things. It's how trees can pull water up from the ground to their leaves."
"Thats pretty fancy Beyo," she said. (hear a baby try to say the word bear)
"Yep."
"You're smarter than the average bear," she said.

After that we drove it to make sure it was fixed. For a few days it worked great without any problems at all. Than a couple days ago on my day off, a day I requested, we were pulling into traffic and there was a snap and a crash followed by a grinding as we slid backwards slowly. I quickly deduced the problem and turned the car off. We called AAA and had them tow it to her Ma's house where it would have to sit until today, my next day off. And today I pulled the axle shaft out to examine it.


You can see the end is rounded off.
I think the metal clip that holds it in failed and allowed the shaft to slip out. And when I tried to get out into traffic all 200 horse power was applied to the end of the shaft rather than the whole length and it shredded those teeth right off. Luckily the transmission is made out of a stronger steel and it is OK.

OR

They gave me the wrong part, a part for another car, one that is too short. Either way there were fresh out of CV axle shafts for a '96 Nissan Maxima. It should be in tomorrow. So after (11 hours of) work I get to install a new axle. Yahoo!

Loo and I recognize how much that sucks, but she needs her car. To help the situation not suck so bad she bought me lunch with plans for two full-body massages, one tonight and one tomorrow.

Winning!

Hopefully tomorrow's new axle install fixes everything.

Huh, I just realized that about a year ago her transmission died. Weird.

Maybe July is rough on transmission?

Purposeless anger

I'm in a weird place right now, emotionally. I'm not sure what's wrong, but I'm sure something is wrong. I think I am depressed for the moment. It kinda runs in the family, but perhaps it hits me least of all. I have no fear revealing everything to you, gentle reader, but I don't want to divulge info about other people. So take it from me when I tell you that I am familiar with depression in myself and others.

I have these depressive episodes where everything pretty much sucks. The things I normally love hold no excitement. Luckily, if there is any luck to be found in depression, these episodes are brief lasting only a day or two or three. I see how living with this everyday would suck beyond all measure of sucky things. I want to tell you that I can't imagine what its like, but I can. I can imagine what its like to live like this without any idea when it will end. I guess I should explain what it's like. I keep forgetting you don't have my brain and can't know what I'm thinking.

Imagine you have a roommate that tells you one day that they peed on your pillow just to make you mad. Imagine the indignation and rage you would feel, all that anger bubbling inside of you. Questions of why and how and wtf, why me, what did I do to deserve that, more importantly what the hell is wrong with you, Roommate?

Now Imagine there is no roommate and no pillow incident. You are just angry and rage filled randomly without a reason. These emotions, very real and powerful, flood your body and brain, but you, your consciousness, recognizes that you are angry for no reason. But you can't turn it off. Everything makes you angry. When your eyes fall on a glass that is half empty (they are always half empty now) it pisses you off. Who had the audacity to fill a glass only half way? That means you will have to get up and refill it sooner. Or you see a towel on a shower rack and it hasn't dried yet. WTF is wrong with this Chinese-slave-labor-special towels that can't dry off after use? And etc, you could see a crooked paper and get angry about how it isn't straight or a pencil with a dull graphite point. Now, somewhere in your brain you know you are being unreasonable, that none of this stuff is important or deserves attention, but it doesn't matter because the feeling remains as strong as ever despite your logical musings.

I know that the conscious mind makes sense of the unconscious, that we have no control over our subconscious and whatever it does whenever it wants gets rationalized by the conscious. So the anger and rage and general pissed-off-ness is there floating around and your conscious mind says, "hey, I should attach this anger to something in the real world." There is so much anger that anything will do. Crooked paper, empty water glass, the urge to pee, people, girlfriend and dirty laundry are all prime candidates for this purposeless anger. I recognize that, so for the things that matter, like Loo, I just tell her I'm not feeling well. In the past this purposeless rage has snuck up on me and I have said some horrible things to her just to pick a fight, just to hurt her because I'm angry and she should be too. Meanwhile a part of me is saying no, don't.

After saying a bunch of mean things to her one time a long time ago she said to me, "You know me so well, for eleven years now, you know just what to say to destroy me." And with her words I could see through the haze just what kind of person I was, like an arrow through fog striking me in the chest. I got the message.

I'd want to tell you that I didn't have control over my body, that I was a puppet and IT did it and I was there in the background whispering, "hey, don't! Stop!" like I was some kind of victim looking for both sympathy and a scapegoat for you to blame and absolve me of responsibility. But the reality is I was there egging myself on because I wanted to break stuff and hurt people and anyone would do. I wanted to.

I should take a moment to point out that I'm not violent an I don't actually break stuff and beat people up, I talk and think things mostly. I recognize this whole anger/rage/haze thing so I intentionally seek solitude. It is hard to hurt others, especially people you love, when you are alone, though it's still possible. I'm using too many commas. Grrr...

After you sit with anger for a bit it gets dull and morphs into this general depression where lights aren't as bright, colors seems dull, food tastes bland and everything makes you frustrated and mad. People could offer you money and you'd bite their head off. I hate being this irrational.

So I am getting sick and most likely on day two of a depressive episode. I don't know if they are related. I heard you can tell you are depressed by hearing a happy story or about how happy people are and getting angry about it, like it makes you sick. So I watched a video about Beth Ostrosky Howard Sterns Wife. I'm a long time Stern fan so I know all about them and like them both a lot. As I listened to the bright and smiling Beth describe her perfect life rescuing animals in the Hamptons I felt a snarl crawl across my teeth. When it was over I wondered what I should do before bed. Nothing interested me even though I have been reading AMAZING books.

About a week ago I tripled the word count of my future best selling book (haha!) to a grand total of 20k. Afterward I felt so goood nothing could bring me down. In light of that experience and this one I wonder if I am manic depressive, aka bipolar. Who knows. Maybe when I can afford to I will see a psychiatrist counselor and she can tell me if I'm messed up or not and what to do about it.

The other thing is I am TIRED of my tire job. I work really hard and don't have much to show for it. And I see that after each ten hour day I am exhausted and not much fun to be around. My days off are more like recovery days than days off. This angers me. I don't want this to be my life. But I need money, you know? I want to write. Even talking to you, gentle reader, has lifted my spirit some.

Which reminds me in my book about Killing people the guy says that sharing depressive stories or feelings and talking about your problems actually HALVES the feelings you carry about it afterward. So you should talk about your problems because the person you tell carries half of it briefly, and after the talk is done you have measurably half the burden to carry while the other person quickly drops the half they were holding. It isn't their burden after all and now you have 50% burden. Winning!

Now that it's late and I still have to pee (stupid bladder!) I should go. Remind me to tell you about Venus, Killing and Free Will.

Do the right thing

I remember Richard Dawkins talking about how humans generally want to do good, it is in our DNA, and there is a physiological reaction to a person in need not unlike sexual lust, a lust to do good. There is a perfectly serviceable evolutionary explanation which he tried not to go into, but after being pressed he had to explain. His point was it doesn't really matter what causes the lust-to-do-good feeling, we know the feeling exists regardless of our understanding. A lot of religious people would quickly tell you that God put that in us. Even though they don't have a biblical leg to stand on. They feel like it must be that way, so that solves it. (Dawkins explains that in our evolutionary history the human population was quite small, and seeing a fellow human in trouble or need was likely a relative and in helping them you help yourself by encouraging reciprocity, and keeping your family line alive and well. Fast forward 300k years and you still have the feeling but only for one person at a time...) I guess I have to get into this now.

There was an experiment and study mentioned in Sam Harris' and Richard Dawkins' Books. In the study they show people pictures of a single person in need. And you know the picture. These are the pictures used by christian charity organizations that say things like, "You can help this ONE person for 11 cents a day" or some such. They found 100% of responders in the study wanted to help the one person in need with 100% of their resources. The lust-to-do-good was strong, the strongest (100%). After that they showed the same people (and different ones for control group) pictures with the same little boy and his little sister. Now there were two kids in dire need of help. Amazingly they found 100% of the responders had a lack luster response, it was less than half the strength of the initial reaction (43%). The prediction for this part of the study was the same I would have predicted, that with two people in need the lust-to-do-good would feel twice as powerful, it seems to me that's how it should work out, but it was less than half. [side note: if more people in need increased the lust-to-do-good feeling it would disprove evolution and natural selection]

They keep going in this vein. Pictures of a family of kids, than an orphanage, than a village, each time the people in need increasing. They found the more people there were in need of help of any kind the more responders COULD NOT CARE. They could vocalize displeasure as in, "That's horrible," but when asked to donate money or help out in some way 100% of responders gave an unfavorable response hovering under 1%. These people were religious and not religious, men and women randomized. The study has been repeated to show this appears to be a universal human constant. All humans in all parts of the world care about one person a lot, even a stranger, especially a child, and their lust-to-do-good takes a steep nosedive with the inclusion of another person. I told you this for three reasons.

Firstly, Humans have a strong desire to be good, do the right thing and help out. The desire to help out and do the right thing alone ISN'T ENOUGH. You have to want to do the right thing, know what will help and than do that. Without understanding how to maximize well-being desire to do good can be very damaging or do nothing. What's that christian saying? "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." Intentions alone aren't enough. I hope I don't have to give examples of this.

Ok I will, and I will pick on a seemingly innocuous non-religious entity. Breast cancer organizations, the pink ribbon, feel your boobies, etc champion a serious cause that kills a lot of women every year (though diarrhea, kills more women a year than breast cancer. It isn't as sexy though.) They take donations, give talks, go on walks, and 'raise awareness' which is where the majority of the donations go. It FEELS good to help. And lots of people do. But does it ACTUALLY help find a cure for breast cancer? Does it actually accomplish what it says it will?

No. In fact they are no closer to finding a cure now than they were before those non profit organization started popping up. If you read the fine print, about one cent per dollar actually goes to cancer research, (they don't say where, or who) which WILL find the cure for cancer. In other words walking around wont find it, talking in hotel lobbies and in parks wont find it, buying shirts, magnets and stickers wont cure it. Dedicated medical science and experimentation and study in a cancer lab is the most likely source of a cancer cure.

So here is a crazy idea: donate to that cancer research lab specifically. Than they get 100 cents of every dollar instead of one. Both the cancer lab and breast cancer awareness organizations have overheads most of the money they get goes there, followed by paying the staff. Than for the nonprofit orgs. comes raising awareness leaving a little bit for the cancer research center. Think about a hundred dollar donation to the Feel Your Boobies people. ONE whole dollar goes to a cancer researcher of their choice. Wahoo! [Side note: this means that a hundred dollar donation to feel your boobies and a one dollar donation to a cancer research center are the same to the cancer center. So a five dollar donation to the cancer research center directly is more money than they normally see. So YOU can help fight cancer for 11 cents a day! So why don't you?]

point 2: without understanding what actually helps humans, one feel-good reason is as good as any other. And this is where average religious person sits, you know, not the easily dismissible zealots we can all agree are bad like the, "Pope who’d tell Africans not to use condoms to protect themselves from AIDS, or a nun who would tell teenagers at a Catholic school that masturbation is evil, or a Mormon who would start a TV campaign in response to Prop 8 about how The Gays are out to corrupt our children. Or for that matter, a Muslim who would fly a plane into a building." No, the average christian, the one who wants to do the right thing (without knowing what that is) who hears an interpretation of a story, he is told, exemplifies how he should act, what he should do, how he should think. That guy, or girl IS A PROBLEM to the rest of us humans as a whole. Often if they do something right that helps people it is by accident. There is a right way to do this, to help people. Quick example: prayer.

Prayer has been tested and studied by science. In regards to people recovering from a common surgery. In every case it has done no better than chance/wishing/voodoo/sugar pills. And It actually harms people, believers most of all. It causes them to require more time to heal than people who were not prayed for, or people who were unaware they were being prayed for indicating it is in the mind of the believer. This means a lot of things, most importantly it means prayer is harmful to people in recovery. When my brother had chest surgery my religious uncle came to him and wanted to tell him that he and his church were praying for him. Kevin cut him off before he could say that and told him not to pray for him. And if he did to keep it to himself because he doesn't want to be recovering any longer than he needs. My uncle was hurt, but I am sure he prayed on his own.

thirdly: Sometimes doing the right thing is counter intuitive, or feels wrong. In some medical procedures causing pain helps people feel better sooner than letting them heal untouched. I suppose my overall point is sometimes wisdom from the superstitious people of bronze-age Palestine isn't wisdom. We can do better now and we should. Thank you.

**steps down from soap box**

Loo's Tonsils part 2 the yawn thief.

"It hurts so bad," Loo said between sobs. It was day four of her tonsillectomy post-op. I could do nothing for her to stop the pain.

I hate this feeling. This impotence. I could only watch her suffer. No. Had to watch her suffer. It was my duty to watch her in pain. I felt like if I looked away it would hurt her more, as though I was saying 'you are on your own,' which I could not do. So I looked into her submerged blue eyes rimmed in red. And she looked back, seeming to plead with me. 'Make it stop,' they said. 'I can't' mine said.

"Together," I said, " we can get through this." I poured the last teaspoon of liquid codeine that looked and smelled like cough medicine into a plastic measuring cylinder-spoon. A liquid medicine measuring device I hadn't seen or used since I was seven years old. She opened her mouth, eyes sealed tightly, anticipating the agony that would follow. I knew if I poured the medicine a certain way it would stick to her tongue and travel down her throat the right way. I knew that capillary action would keep the medicine on her tongue and travel down her tongue without touching the back of her throat and it would minimize the pain. I did not know that at first, but in trying to find ways to not hurt her I figured it out. The medicine slipped down her tongue, down her throat and she swallowed it. Her hand shot out and gripped my arm. Her nails dug into my bicep. It hurt. I wanted to pull my arm away. Instead I held her as she cried, wracked with pain. I watched her as her nails dug deeper into my arm. Sweat leapt to the surface of her fair and freckled face, her skin turned red, the strained veins swelled beneath her skin, a delta of emerald rivers pulsing underground.

"Fuck!" she would yell.
"I know" I would say. What else could I say?
"Fuck bear, that hurt so bad," she said opening her eyes. Bear is her nickname for me. Not because I am furry, because I am not. But because, well, it's a long story. Suffice it to say she renames a lot of things. The dog park is now referred to as the bark park. Song birds are tweeters, chipmunks are chippies and so on.

She described the pain in her throat as the most pain ever. She had to drink a gallon of water a day and take oral medication every four hours. Mealtime immediately followed medication. The medicine took the pain away enough that she could eat. Small bites, chewed thoroughly could sometimes be swallowed. Other times they could not and though she was hungry she couldn't eat another bite. I ate those.

I found myself very protective of her at this point. I couldn't do very much, but what was in my power to control I did. I took it upon myself to mitigate the pain every chance I could. Beverages and food were presented at the perfect temperature, conversations were cut short, topics of conversation I knew would turn into long arguments between her family and her were avoided, sometimes nimbly, elegantly, other times not so much. I didn't really care though, avoidance of pain was my focus. The niceties of everyday interactions and conversations were overlooked. People might have said I was terse, annoying, or something else. I could not care. I would not allow pain to get my Loo.

Sometimes we would communicate with text messages standing two feet apart. Sometimes pointing and gestures were easier. We used my dry erase board for a bit. A few days later she could start talking again, but certain words were difficult to say. Our roommates dog Cody was called Hohy because the c and d sounds hurt her throat. Cody came to this name anyway, the tone was the same, which I what dogs recognize. Than came the yawns.

Oh the yawns. The first yawn caught her off guard. Her hands went up suddenly and fluttered, flapping like a bird. She yawned. Than she screamed and cried. I held her, asked what happened.

"The yawn," she said, "wors.pain.evah."
"Oh," I said.
"Rememmer tha hime you yawn and I diggs you and you lose it?"
"The time you jabbed me in the side when a yawn was coming and it went away like you stole it?"
She nodded.
"What about it?"
"When I gib the signal I wan you to sdeal my yawn by smakin me."
"I don't want to smack you."
"Please," she said pleading.
"I dont want to hurt you," I said.
"I order you. No more yawns," she said. Tears filled her eyes and she whispered, "Neber again. Neber again."

I thought about it. I didn't want to strike her like she wanted me too, but I didn't want her to experience the worst.pain.ever. I was reading a book then, still am now. The Moral Landscape by Sam Harris. In it he describes a lot of things that are counter intuitive that actually help, and we should focus on ameliorating pain rather than doing what feels right or good, because that can mislead us. We get caught up in feeling good about doing something, rather than doing something good that doesn't feel so good. An example he gives is when they first started doing the colonoscope procedure to detect cancer in its operable stages before anesthesia. It hurt quite a bit, as you might imagine, but they found that the procedure, while painful, was lifesaving. Also, if they yanked the colonoscope out after they were done it hurt the most, a painful cherry added to the already horrible pain-sundae. It was such a painful experience people would not come back. But, some doctor, I forget his name, decided to leave the colonoscope inside the body for some time after the procedure which produced a dull pain. In fact it added to the total amount of pain. But the person only remembered the dull pain, and forgot the excruciating pain prior to that. They returned for future colonoscope procedures decreasing death by cancer in the human population. Everybody wins. The Doctor accomplished it by increasing pain.

Six hours later she made a sharp pleading moan. I had learned her moans very well by this point. This one was the pre-yawn signal. I knew what I had to do. I swiped my hand at her and struck her in the shoulder and hand, a stinging sensation tingled my palm. And though she shook her hand afterward she thanked me profusely. We both felt good, her for dodging the yawn and me for not having to strike her in the face or body. The hand I could do. And would do. Sometimes it took multiple strikes. She would let me know when the yawn passed when her hand stopped flapping. So I would strike and slap and pinch and punch until her hand stopped flapping.

At first I felt bad, striking her. I made a promise to myself not to strike girls when I was seven. And on some gut level it felt wrong to me. Now that I am 27 I have to amend that promise to myself. I promise not to strike a woman unless she asks me to and only if it will help her.

After days of stealing her yawns, repressing my own and turning her away from the yawns of others it became second nature to smack her and steal her yawn. We went and saw the new X-Men movie, First Class (awesome movie, best x-men movie I think). As the credits rolled by and the lights came on I saw her hand flapping her hand toward me, the other on her throat. Instinctively I struck her all over until the yawn was gone. I hadn't given any thought to how this might look to others. What they might think, what they might do. I heard murmurs, whispers and hushed conversation and the guy behind me scowled. I prepared to duck a blow. and stood up quickly. What could I say? She made me do it? She told me to? It's her fault? I'm trying to steal her yawn? Nothing could be said, so I left with her quickly. Not that quickly, because she is still recovering form surgery, but quicklyish.

Loo's Tonsils part 1

Ten days ago Loo had her tonsils removed. Never having experienced anyone losing their tonsils I didn't know what to expect. The procedure itself, the surgeon told us, would take ten minutes. Loo would be under general anesthetic and it would take at least an hour before she came to, and another hour after that when she would be coming in and out of consciousness. I was familiar with that when my brother was recovering from chest surgery about a year ago. Consciousness than was a short order cook in a slow diner, moving between busy and calm on a whim.

The anesthetist told us she would be out for a couple hours. Having been to the hospital with Loo in the past I knew her to be resistant to local anesthetics, narcotics and other medicine. Vicodin has no effect, local anesthetics do not work, Novocain might as well be water. I felt like it was my duty to tell the anesthetist about this.

"I don't know if it is relevant to you or not," I said to the anesthetist, "but, she is highly resistant to anesthesia and narcotics."

The anesthetist, an older, wiry, tall man in surgical greens looked at me in a way that made me feel stupid. It was a look I might have given customers at the tire store that told me to simply bolt the spare tire onto their mid 90's corvette after the news that their tire was no good and not safe to repair. (90's corvettes and newer do not have spare tires, relying instead on run-flat tires)

The anesthetist said, "She will be under general," as if that obviously cleared everything up.

"Kay," I said. He smiled, it looked forced to me, and he walked out.

The surgeon entered the room next. She was an attractive young woman with mascara, brown hair and fair skin, straight teeth and a big smile. She asked the question we had all anticipated.

"Do you have any questions for me?" she asked. I should have said earlier that the room was occupied by Loo, her mom and myself plus the surgeon. For whatever reason Ma dislikes and distrusts our baby dinosaur Bup (a one year old Savannah Monitor) and she got it into her head that Bup would be dangerous to Loo during recovery. Something about reptile to human germ transfer.

"I have a question about pets during her recovery," Ma said.

"That has nothing to do with this," said the surgeon, "but go ahead."

"She has a monitor lizard," Ma said.

"Yeah?" said the surgeon. she seemed to search for the relevance.

"Isn't it unsafe for her to recover around that?" Ma said while nodding.

"No. Not at all. Reptiles are very clean and have few germs that are transferable to humans. Dogs are the ones to look out for. Dogs lick their wounds, and a dog will smell her wound and try to lick her to make her better. Dogs have fewer germs in their mouths than we do, but they are bad, bad guys you do not want in your mouth. So no dog kisses."

"But a lizard is bad, right?" Ma asked nodding her head.

"No," the surgeon said shaking her head, "Lizards are fine."

"See," Loo said.

"Ok," Ma said.

"But," said the surgeon, "Good question, that is an exotic pet. It's good to make sure." I agree with that, even when the sixth or seventh doctor says it, as it comes up every time it can. After that the surgeon had some information about recovery.

"Right after surgery you should go to wendy's and get a frosty and fries for her. Dip the hot salty fries into the frosty and eat it. Doctor's orders."

I think we all thought she was kidding. She continued on. "Seriously, the salt is good at killing germs, and helps hold onto water, which you will be drinking, a gallon a day," she said pointing at Loo, "And for the nerves, the temperature signal takes precedent over the pain signal. The hot and cold occupy the nerve so that it has no room for pain. So fries dipped in chocolate. Doctors orders."

They came and took her then. I prepared to wait a long time. I had my computer and my books and looked forward to catching up on some reading and writing.

Nine minutes from when they rolled her away the surgeon told us the surgery was a success and Loo was in recovery.

We prepared for the two hour wait. I got settled into the waiting room sofa chair. I mean really hunkered down. It wasn't 5 minutes later that we were told she was ready to go. I packed everything back in and walked back there.

Loo was sitting upright eating sherbet. As I walked in she waved at me. She gave no indication of feeling dopey or drugged. She had to take an IV bag of fluids before she could go. All the nurses and people were very surprised Loo was awake and ready to go so quickly. I repressed the "I told you so," I wanted to tell everyone.

She walked into the family van, and we went to Wendy's for fries and a frosty. It was surprisingly tasty.

"I feel fine," Loo said, "I think this is going to be good and easy." She pointed to her frosty dipped fries, "I could get use to this."

"doctors orders," I said. I was relieved she was healing so well. They said the pain would be bad for ten days. Day one at this point was no sweat.

Joke

What do you call a black man that flies planes?

...

A pilot, you racist!



Black can be replaced with woman, answer can be replaced with sexist: woman/sexist

there are others like gay/homophobe. And others still left to discover. I like this joke.

The three people I met on the Rapture

I met three really strange people today, the day of the rapture, or some such.

First: A woman getting an air check at the tire store today told me she didn't have to be nice and insisted on being rude and mean because, as she explained to me, the world ends today at 6pm precisely.

One timezone at a time?
Or is that Pacific standard time?
Or Jerusalem standard time?
Or New Zealand time which is 23 hours ahead where it's Sunday, the day of rest. Oh noes!

The woman was very rude, ordered me around told me to hurry up, talked about the rapture and about how she didn't have to keep up this facade and didn't give a shit and Jesus was coming, Hallelujah! I asked her if she thought Jesus would approve of her treatment of others on his return trip to earth (on Air-God? interdemensional travel line?). She immediately stopped being Douchey Mc Doucherton and started apologizing profusely to me saying she had made a mistake and asked if I could forgive her. I immediately wanted to say that forgiveness is between her and God, but I didn't. Instead I nodded and told her to have a nice day and went back to work.

And then she called out to me asking if she could make an appointment to rotate her tires tomorrow. I was almost dumbstruck. I thought about making some kind of comment about only if the world is still here, but in all honesty I think she had mental problems and I was keen to slip away like sand through fingers. I sent her up front.

Later I pulled a car in to be worked on, well, let me start over. I approached the beat up car, opened the door and found the inside to be covered in rosary beads and crucifixes. I had to remove a clump of them from the seat before I could sit down. I didn't want to get poked in the butt by Jesus.

When I started the car I looked into the rearview mirror. It was wrapped in rosaries and unusable as mirror. When I pulled the gear lever down some rosaries fell to the floor bright red ones. Through the speakers came the voice of some dull monotoned woman saying those famous catholic prayers. I dont know thier names, but you might. It was the one about mother mary full of grace. And then an audience of people repeated this woman. It sounded like the Borg from Star Trek. Then she spoke again, some other line of a prayer. I thought it was pretty ballsy to play something so Christiany on the radio, but it was actually a CD on track three, seven minutes in. I immediately started making judgments about the kind of person that would drive this vehicle: She was old, white hair, unmarried, unattractive, overweight, a cat lady with a mean countenance that said 'thanks a lot,' and, 'god bless,' often.

The prayer stuff was turning my stomach so I turned it off. As I drove over the hydraulic lift all the rosaries, crucifixes and mother Mary figurines started swaying and clinking together, a pitter-patter of plastic rain. After I repaired the tire an old woman, described above, came over to ask what was in. When I told her it was ascrew that punctured her tire and that I had drilled it out to remove the rust and filled it with a plug, a patch, a chemical cement and a sealer and that it would never ever leak again from that spot she said, "Thanks a lot. God Bless." As I handed her the paper work I saw she was without a ring on her finger. As far as I could tell, my original prediction was accurate.

Person number three was a middle aged fat black man in gray sweat pants and a sports jersey. I know nothing of sports so I can't tell you anything about it. There were numbers and colors and a name, if it helps. Anyway he was standing behind the car I was torquing and he was talking. Now to whom I do not know, because as far as I could tell he was totally alone. I couldn't help but over hear what he was talking about.

He said, "I'm burying my face in your Poo-say, can you feel it?"

I stopped torquing to turn around to see him. He turned a bit to face me and I saw he had a bluetooth ear piece in. So he was not insane. Nothing to worry about there, just your average large man standing behind his car in a parking lot having phone sex while I finish his vehicle. Right before I got out of earshot he said, "I am pounding your Poo-say. You feel me inside you? Uh huh. I am slamming into your cervix. Ummhmm you know it gurl." I torqued the left front wheel than the right front than approached the right rear, the final wheel. I heard him say

"I'm filling you up gurl. You gaining weight now gurl. Mmhmm you gonna be white after it soak into you."

I gave him his paper work, told him to have a nice day. He thanked me and walked to his car talking about someone getting drenched.

It started to rain.

Dirty, dirty rain.

The Rapture

Is when the really douche-baggey religious people get yanked bodily into heaven and the rest of us lot have to fend for ourselves. I'm all for that.

Shows that we watch

Loo and I watch shows together. My TV sits along my bed so we either lay in bed like spoons and watch the screen or I brace the wall with pillows and sit on the bed and she leans on me. Either way with me being tired all the time a show is a great way to spend time together. We watch a few shows together. I think I will talk about them one at a time based on popularity or frequency.

Bones

This is a 'dark comedy' crime show for those of you who don't know. We are almost current with this one. Recently we have been aware of some changes in character, plot and layout. I think it was in season five when there was a strong hippie, vegan, organic food slant. Characters all of a sudden had strong opinions about organic food and most of them were positive. I think the organic food movement is intellectually bankrupt and dishonest, so I don't appreciate the heavy handed organic-food-is-awesome-writers writing it into the show especially without offering another position other than"gosh I guess I was wrong all this time." Someone like Bones who is obsessed with empirical data could have quoted the study that talked about Organic food being less good for your body than ...inorganic food(?)... aka standard food. But no. Shortly after that show one of the characters made a huge deal about rescuing a piglet from a slaughter house. And it almost broke the friendship between Bones and Angela, two major characters for those who don't watch the show. The writing used to be sharp and even handed, but not any more. That is annoying. As time goes on it is becoming more soap-opera-ey, also annoying. Than the writers had characters break up for lame reasons, and get back together for lame reasons, which makes it feel like they are doing it to keep the show chaotic, so I get it. But there is a difference between doing it and doing it well, the Bones writers have been letting us down. I like the show for the science and the character interplay, and the science seems to be diminishing replaced with a montage of Bones looking at bones up close with music and when it is all over she goes, "I got it." Also there is A LOT more product placement, including Bing!, Toyota and the new windows phone. It's cool if you put products in there, but do not spend character dialog on products! Seriously.

Castle

We are current with this show, watching the episodes as they become available on Hulu. I loved this show since day one. Firstly it has Nathan Fillion in it and I am a fan since Firefly. Secondly Castle is a writer, like me, and talks a lot about writing craft. Like praising people for using irony correctly, (so rare) and yelling at them when they get it wrong, and correcting gramatical errors on ransom notes, and wincing at bad prose, or awkwartd sentences. Hilarious, even if I am the only one laughing in the room. Thirdly Stana Katic is sharp and beautiful and I like watching her. Fourthly the other characters Ryan and Esposito work well together, sometimes talking about writing and quoting The Bard. This show has better writers than Bones, I think. The characters are consistent from episode to episode and season to season. Any changes in character are accountable from previous episodes. They do not suddenly argue about the majesty of organic food for example. I also like the gender dynamic between Castle and Beckett. He is big and rich and hansom, but a total doofus in a fight and useless with a gun. Beckett is the badass that saves him from trouble and maintains her femininity. For example there was this scene where they go to a suspects door and it is locked. And Castle says, "You going to kick it down?" and Beckett says, "Are you kidding, these are [nice shoes]." And Castle goes, "well can I kick it down?" and she looks at him like he's crazy and says, "No. NYPD, Open up." And the suspect opens the door. She gives him a look and he looks ashamed. Makes me smile even now. Great show.

GLEE

... Bed time, I'll be back

Shoes

Shoes go on your feet. They can be a fashion accessory or make a statement. One statement comes to mind with the original converse shoe. People bought it because it was anti-establishment and cool, they bought so many of them that the converse people had to become an establishment to keep up. This made hipsters mad, but not mad enough to stop buying them. Converse still trumpets its anti-establishment stance, just not very far.

I recently bought shoes. This is a rare occurrence for me. It wouldn't normally be blog-worthy, but seeing as how I rarely write anymore, any topic is better than no topic. Also shoes have suddenly been a big thing recently. Here's the story:

I was down to my last pair of shoes, a busted and abused pair of black converse (I bought them because they were on sale for 25 bucks--Chinese slave-labor special). My usual modus operandi is to by casual shoes that are black so when I wear out my black work shoes I can switch them out and toss the old work shoes out. They last about a year. Anyway money was tight a while back, until I got my tax return. I wore the same pair of shoes everywhere. They were so abused. The left one is cracked from repetitive kneeling while the top of the right one is scuffed away from lifting tires with it while kneeling. There are other occupation markers, but it isn't important.

Then I got to work 54 hours for a couple weeks and made a bit of money, but had no time to spend it. Also I had hardly any time to do anything else. I was so tired from working all day that I would simply shower after work, eat dinner and go to bed to do it all over again the next day. It made it hard to do anything writing related. I felt like I wanted to do something fun and anything would do. That something might be a book or an episode of a show or a video game. Perhaps I have inflated writing to this status where it needs my full attention and when I can't give it that I wont attempt to write at all. (But after talking to Erin for an hour and a half she really encouraged me just to do it. Hard work, walk it, no cable car.)

I had to dress up to go to another lame tire corporate meeting in Lansing and I couldn't wear my broken work shoes because the Suits would have made disparaging comments and ordered me to get new ones because I am the face of the tire company and I must look sharp. So I borrowed my roommates' shoes. Amazingly he has bigger feet than me, size 13 while I am a piddly size 12.

I wore a suit to the meeting. I love that thing. I feel fancy and people on the street call me Mr. and sir. That is not the reason I love it though. It has so many pockets and I feel like a spy reaching inside my sport coat to get my wallet. Loo found the suit for me at Nuway the thrift store (her favorite store. She always finds great stuff for great prices it's eerie, like a super power.) So with borrowed shoes on my feet and a thrift store suit on my body I went to the meeting and got all kinds of comments about dressing up.

"It must have cost you a fortune for that suit. I guess that's no matter to you, eh California?" (that's my nickname)
"Actually," I said, "Loo got this for me at Nuway for four dollars." The response to this was strange. Envy maybe? I didn't know, but they quickly dropped it and focused on sports teams instead. There are a lot of them. I know nothing about sports, so I read a book.

Then there was some dinner I had to dress up for so I asked to borrow the shoes again. Than Loo graduated and I had to borrow them again. Than we went to see Yo Yo Ma so I dressed up again, but I felt bad for borrowing the shoes and wearing them more than he did so I used the failing work shoes. They fell apart while Mr. Ma passionately played his Cello. I walked out with the shoes flapping in the air. I don't know how they kept together, but they did. Tough shoes. Also my only belt broke.

The next day was my day off. My to do list looked like this:

Shoes!
Belt!
Eggs.

I looked into my closet behind Bup's cage (a young Savannah monitor lizard) and looked at my hanging shoe shelf. It was slim pickings in there, but there was one pair of shoes left. For the first time in a year I slipped my well worn flip flops on. The shoes reminded my feet of California beach days while I walked to my car on a gray, cold and rainy Michigan day, the fourth nasty day with two more to go, but I didn't know that at the time.

I walked into Meijers (for you California types this is a mega store, like a walmart where you can get groceries as well as automotive supplies, furniture and etc.) and looked for the shoes on sale. I found some black boots for 40 bucks, which in my experience is both the average price for black boots and the maximum I am wiling to pay. I knew I was size 12 so I picked them out and put them in the blue wire mesh cart without trying them on. Those would be my casual shoes. I wanted to get some fancy shoes on account of the fancy events I had been attending recently. I found some brown ones for 15 bucks. Winning! I grabbed a size 12 and threw those in the cart. Then I went looking for work shoes. I found some Dr. Shoels (sp) black shoes for 30 bucks. Score! I threw a size 12 in the cart. Then I went to get a belt. Actually, this is the boring part. I got a new compliment of leather goods, belts, wallet, shoes. And a pair of Levi jeans. All of my old leather goods were failing. And since I needed them and had money I bought them.

I think you and I are expecting a punchline about putting those shoes on for the first time. But there is no punchline. They fit great. 12 is my size. My jeans on the other hand, not so much. I stopped working out and my butt must have shrank. 34" is too large. Good thing I bought some belts. Time to hit the gym.

When I got home Loo bought new shoes as well. They were neon pink Kroc knock offs. She liked how they felt on her feet. The color was cool too. She also got these golden and bejeweled high heels that she wore to graduation. At her commencement I was able to spot her by her shoes, dazzling gold beneath her dark graduation gown.

And then she bought sexy shoes to wear just for me.

I have never had a reaction to shoes before. I've always been, "whatever, they go on your feet," about shoes. Than she bought these stiletto high heel things by Candies. They are a little platform high heel stiletto thing black and white plaid with a black leather bow over the toes. She wore them for the first time today.

Yowza!

With those shoes on she stands eye to eye with me. I have never had a girl I saw eye to eye with before. I am always taller, always. At six foot four inches it's easy to do. But looking into her eyes without looking down took me by surprise and I had this childlike reaction. I just had to hug her and say how cool it was. I didn't realize how a shoe like that would also change the way she walked and the way her legs looked and she suddenly filled me with this dopey feeling and for a good 20 minutes I was totally enamored with her and her shoes.

I felt so silly, but I couldn't help it.

I can't think of an ending to this so I'll just share the second stanza from Pablo Neruda's Ode to a Pink Shoe:

it holds me
moves me
carries me
across asphalt ocean
and gravel dreams
stained by travel
to carnival skies

Great job Loo!

Wow it has been a long time. And as always a lot has happened. Loo graduated with a degree in Accountancy. I am so proud of her. It is a really tough degree to crack, made more difficult with crappy professors, health problems, car problems, family problems, friend problems also known as life. Which is why graduating is so important, it means that despite hardship you persevered. I read somewhere that about 2% of people get a degree. I'm currently too tired to go check that out, but the point is that it is a small population of people that make it to the end. So kudos to Loo for making it. The sleep deprivation and late night study sessions are over and I don't have to see any more scary accountancy formulas.

Now she can get her CPA certification thing, make 6 figures a year, live in California with me in our own super cool house, and I can be her house boy; massaging her feet, shoulders, back and neck every night, making delicious dinner every night and writing best sellers in my free time, which would be often. At that rate we should be able to retire in five years. YaY!

All we need now is jobs :-/

Portal 2

Is a masterpiece. I played co-operative with my roommate for three hours and it didn't feel like ten minutes went by. It makes you think and with two people thinking together there is a huge feeling of accomplishment when we succeed. If you liked the first portal, or like video games or Valve I highly recommend you check it out. I think anybody could pick this game up and play it no skills required.

In normal mode you play a human ( I think ) but in co-op you play one of two robots a short fat one named Atlas and a tall skinny one named P-body. When you die as a human it is game over but as a robot a new one just gets made. It comes to a point where you get stuck and it is easier to die and start over than to get unstuck. Also that means the level hazards are more devestating and difficult because if you fail there is one second of down time until a new robot identical to the first drops down and you can try again. Meanwhile GLADOS the synthetic creepy voice makes funny and disparaging comments about it like, "...Will someone remake Atlas please?" except she says orange or blue depending on your guy who has orange or blue trim for players 1 and 2. Anyway, fun game.

I'd say more but I'm getting over an illness and should sleep.

Character sketch: Veronica Meyers - Lesbian Gasoline

I want to tell you about Veronica Meyers.

I saw her headbutt another girl at a club once. I don't know what the argument was about, but Veronica laid the other girl out before going back on the dance floor. I asked her about it later and she said, "Bitch was annoying, I got bored."
"So you headbutted her?" I asked. The logic didn't track for me.
"Yeah." She said. She could have been waiting for a drink.
"What if she calls the police?" I asked, just one of the many concerns I had that would prevent me from headbutting someone that annoyed me.
"And says what?"
"Some crazy dike headbutted her."
"Who'd believe that? Girls are all emotional. Probably PMSing"
"Well, there's that," I said. Veronica went back to the dance floor. She liked to dance.

Another time I saw a guy grab her ass on the dance floor. She spun on her heel with an extended knee. The guy was down for the count. I heard he needed surgery later, but that could just be a rumor.

Once I was getting hassled about parking and Veronica convinced the guy she would blow him if he let us park in the lot, which was supposedly full. The guy agreed and scheduled a time for her to meet him after we were done clubbing. She didn't stick to the time and when he approached her all hot and heavy she went down like she was going to blow him and stood up real quick. The top of her head slammed into his chin and he fell back unconscious. I felt bad for the guy, I empathized with him, you know? You think you are getting your lucky break, that some super hot chick was so desperate to park and so fast and loose with her body and inhibitions she would blow you for a parking spot. The guy didn't know the super hot chick was like a lesbian superhero. And I mean nobody knows that at first glance. How could you? Besides only about seven percent of the female population is gay. Veronica looks like a porn princess, her body speaks to heterosexual DNA and says, "You must make babies with that woman." She says its like a curse to be pursued and followed by slimy guys. But I digress, the parking guy was okay and standing up as we drove away.

I invited Veronica to a party once and I told her to stay away from this one girl, Tina, because I had my eye on her and Veronica said that she would, no sweat.

I guess my first mistake was believing her. My second mistake was leaving Tina and Veronica alone for a moment while I took a piss. On my way out I had to help a girl hold her date over the toilet as he vomited up what seemed like a gallon of whiskey. Fucking fraties, you know? They think whiskey doesn't apply to them.

When I got back out to the living room Veronica and Tina were lip locked. Tina's hands were on Veronica's face, while Veronica's were on Tina's ass. I watched them for awhile in seeming lesbian bliss, Veronica pulling her in closer. This was a moment in life where I had a choice to be angry or not. "Fucking Veronica," I said. I smiled and had a good time at my party.

The next morning Veronica walked up to me, bite marks and hickies on the tops of her breasts, probably other places as well.
"Bit yourself shaving again?" I asked. She smiled, maybe embarrassed. I couldn't tell.
"Happens. Look man, she came on to me," she said as though that explained it.
"A likely story," I said only half kidding.
"I told her you had dibs on her," she said. I laughed.
"I bet you tried really hard to hammer that home," I said. Veronica stuck her tongue out, biting the steel stud and smiled.
"Yeah, hammered it real hard. But she wouldn't have it. Now I'm pretty aggressive, but Tina makes me look timid by comparison."
"uh huh."
"And she said she wanted me. I said no."
"Bullshit!" I said and laughed, she smiled.
"And then she kissed me, and I could tell that she really did."
"Uh huh, and when does the rationalization come?"
"Here: because I didn't actively pursue her and did my very best to ignore her, this was not a violation of trust because she came after me," she looked at me and started doing that ubiquitous twisted body-rocking motion made famous by little innocent girls pleading for an ice cream. It's interesting to note that her feminine wiles still work on me even though I know there is zero chance of the two of us getting together.
"You are such a shit," I said. We both laughed.
"Forgiven?"
"Forgiven."
"Hugs?"
"Hugs." I said and hugged her. "Can you try harder to shut them down? I really liked that girl."
"It wouldn't have worked out between you two, I awakened the lesbian flame in her. I doubt she'll ever go for dick again."
"I just have to prevent you from dumping lesbian gasoline on that flame."
"No man, it was already there, like a pilot light. If not me than someone would have turned her burner on."
"Can we move away from fire metaphors now?"
"Yeah I was getting bored and ready to headbutt you anyway," she said and we both laughed. Then we went out to breakfast.

Ah Veronica.

Rick Santorum's google problem

Former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum seems like an anti-gay religious wacko to me. And in 2003 he likened gay sex to bestiality, pedophilia and other nasty things. This wasn't the first or last time he would say such things. Dan Savage took notice and held a neologism contest to attribute his name to the nastiest sex thing anybody could come up with.

I imagine at the time the anti-gay crowd, in their infinite naïvete to gay sex and gay culture, thought this a meaningless exercise. What's the worst that could happen?

Somehow they forgot that gay men, are in fact, men. And further that men are well versed in being exceptionally gross and disgusting when there is call to do so. It is part of our natural male super powers along with opening stubborn jars, fixing things with our hands, being out of touch with our feminine side, our inability to have opinions on fabric, and other things. In fact it is normal and natural to have competitions revolving around who can gross out the other most. Such contests can go on for months. This is an innate ability for men, as women need training to do this. Such training usually comes from being a coroner, nurse, vet and etc. (however one of womenfolk's innate abilities is to pick up or otherwise clean the nastiest stuff in the world without complaint, like vomit, baby poop and month old rotten food; men require training to do this, such as being a coroner, trash collector or similar. Though men can talk about it later, and often do to gross out other men.)

Where was I? Right, so when Dan Savage proposed this contest to find the grossest sex related thing gay people searched long and hard proposing one thing after another and than voted. After much time a clear winner was determined. That winner was then attributed to Rick Santorum and it is easily known by googleing 'Santorum.' Go ahead, Google it if you are unaware, everyone else: onward!

Santorum than became the subject of a google bomb as people began, purposefully, searching for the phrase. Now 'Santorum,' that poignant frothy mix of feces and anal lube is way more popular than the senator.

You can imagine how difficult it might be to run for president when everything you say is cast in frothy brown font. Thus we have Rick Santorum's Google problem. A problem he wants desperately to be rid of, but one that has been going strong since 2003 and gives no indication of slowing down.

Furthermore Rick Santorum (as far as I can tell) is bat-shit nuts and wants to be president in 2012 (idk why he would bother because we all know the world blows up then) and he has been trying to pass bills that regulate sex and masturbation. Both of those are very dear and near to my heart so I will do my part to fight tooth and nail to make sure Mr. Froth fails at every opportunity.

I predict in the future, long after the memory of the senator, Santorum will live on, strong as ever, as a very accurate description of an appalling, gross, vile, nauseating, detestable, and revolting man.

Take it away Dan:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG62Gh8ffbY

Ah, Miss Yalie

What a pleasure it was to talk to my great friend Yalie all the way in Paris, France. Through the amazing and free technology of Skype. I even saw her smiling face and watched her talk. Until it froze in a zombie like pose at the end. Clearly technology has come a long way with still further to go. :-)

(She said she would check out my blog, so I had better write more and more often.)

It's a beautiful California winter day. Blue sky and sunlight and 55 degrees. My best friend Mike and I are going to go hiking along the Cozy Dell Trail near his house. It's a few miles long and climbs to the top of a mountain that overlooks the valley. I will try to bring back pictures. It rained yesterday so I hope it isn't muddy, but if it is it won't stop us.

After living in the flat lands for the last 11 months these mountains make me especially happy. I was telling my brother Kevin about driving differences here and there. In Michigan, the land of seemingly infinite flat land, driving is straight and direct and takes time to get from place to place solely from the distance separating places. More than that though, you have no feeling for progress as you drive. You could fast forward the drive two hours or rewind it two hours and it would be hard to tell where you were, it looks very similar. In Cali there are mountains, hills, valleys, ocean. As you drive you get closer to the mountains, you feel like you're going somewhere.

I have more to tell you, but I have to go hiking.

So, lets do this again sometime soon. Remind me to tell you about showering at home and driving in LA after 11 months of michigan driving, and the definition of cold.

Terminal Reality

While I sit at the Gerald R Ford international airport terminal a memory comes to mind, sudden, unbidden. I had a strange class called filmic bodies which was a dance class, and a few others. I called it my si-fi theory class, because that's what it was. One of the many books we had to read was 'Terminal Identity' which tried to convey the idea that life is very much like a terminal at an airport, or computer screen with respect to how things around us seem to change, yet stay the same. For example while I sit here lots of people get in and step out of planes, people I will probably never see again, yet this place remains the same unchanged, a terminal for people to pass through. Also like a computer terminal that remains largely the same, yet new people step up and use it. As though what matters is the terminal rather than the faceless person using the terminal. There was a bunch of other stuff it talked about within its 420 pages, which I must admit I didn't read at all. Although I have plans to do so.

The whole point of this was to artificially create a seeming natural start that would lend it self 'organically' to a segue to my present position inside an airport.

But now that I've told you... ah shucks.

So yeah, here I am in the middle of the terminal sitting in the corner, writing, with my iPod in, listening to heavy metal cellos (Apocalyptica), trying to think of something really cool and poignant to say.

I got nothing, however.

I am going home to So Cal for two weeks or so to celebrate my birthday on the 15th. I'll be... 27... Wow. Where did all the time go? Did I mention Alexander the Great conquered the known world by the time he was 25? And that Copernicus... ah you know the story. I'm trying to convey to you the feeling I have in regards to my age and how I haven't done anything earth shaking yet. I feel destined for greatness--also aware of how cheesy and naive that sounds--and I also feel immobilized by fear, perhaps of failure. Imagine I do my best and I think its amazing and others read it and think its a joke, or bad or stupid or [insert pessimistic thought here].

I see now as I write it down it is stupid to think this way, the largest obstacle in my way is me.

"What if they..." Screw them. Write without fear, grab them by the collar and shake them, dare them to read. That is the only way to get the really good stuff, you know like when you dance when you think you are alone, but someone is watching nearby, impressed by your secret skills.

I haven't read anything really good lately. And I haven't written anything really good lately either. It makes me sad and confused, I mean this is what I do, and yet at the same time it isn't. I think in terms of writing. When I tell a story I tell it as though it's been written down already to maximize its gravity or punch or what have you. I think this lack of... certainty? Direction? is the main reason I applied to grad school, I think there I will be pushed, prodded and urged to face this anxiety/directionless and understand where to go/what to do. If not, I will be forced to figure it out. Then I can make lots of money from my best sellers and give all my friends Ferraris and have fun all day. YAY!

New topic: For my birthday Loo took me to my first Burlesque show. It was pretty cool I have to say. The venue was not so good, the sound was atrocious, perhaps because the sound guy was updating his FaceBook status during the show, or because he had seven jack n cokes before the first act. I lost track after nine because I was watching the dancing girls who were cute, limber, talented and topless. They were doing some cirque de solei stuff with yoga like balance and stretching and some impressive hula-hoop stuff. But they used the fat guy too much. I think once it would have been ok, like they whet your whistle with the first act than say, "you ain't seen nothing yet!" and a whole bunch of girls in a ring come out hiding someone in the middle. The music builds up, the spotlight illuminates the center, the girls drop and this 400 pound man in a bikini is there with a blond wig and he imitates the cute girl that he followed on stage. I'd be ok with that because I think its funny, but they used that fat guy a lot, at least six times. Anyway it merits another visit I think when it hits a larger stage with better sound.

Anyway, when I got home from the burlesque show My roommates were throwing a ground hogs day party. I came right as it was dying and I went to bed, and then somehow it got resurrected and the music came back, and the yelling and the girls talking about lesbian experiences to the boys who played the interested anthropologist archetype for their stories, perhaps in hopes that in sharing in the lesbian experience with them they will have bonded in some way and sex is on. Sometimes it works.

Also, there is a big map on the living room wall of the USA and that means that the party people in their various levels of inebriation must approach the map and strike it with their finger and say, "I been there. Where have you been?" Then another finger strike, "I been there," to which the other says, "I haven't been there. I been here," to which the other one repeats the first one a few times before it changes to places they have heard about and would like to go. It is never anything more than a location. Like it would never be, "I want to go to Yellowstone to see the geothermal activity/see the geysers/check out the lava tubes," it is, "I want to go there," followed by a finger striking paper sound.

Where was I? Oh yeah, it was around 4am and I was able to tune them out and I was almost asleep when someone said, "Hey, the plural for octopus, is it 'octopuses' or 'octopi?'"

To my pillow I said, "It's octopuses."

"I think it's Octopuses," someone says. But they didn't sound sure, which leaves room for the loudmouth to declare the answer in such a way that others will believe him.

"No, it's octopi," someone says, "I know for sure." What follows next is surprise at being so smart and knowing lots of interesting stuff.

"you liar," I say to no one in particular. I wanted to get up and tell them that the plural of octopus is octopuses because the plural form follows the Greek suffix, and it wouldn't make sense to add a Latin plural ending to a Greek suffix; in order for that to work the word would have to be Latin in origin, 'octoped' in which case the plural would be 'octopedi,' but instead of getting up I rolled over and tried to bury myself under a pillow.

Sometime later there was a debate, so far as drunk arguing at 5am can get close to a debate as there was some semblance of civil discourse. The topic of discussion was the difference between alliteration and "the other one" (assonance). But they were getting it wrong. The urge to get up, correct them for their erroneous use of literary terms and yell at them to go to bed was getting stronger. I expected their topics to jump around to politics, pop culture, music or sex, but they stayed on literary terms. From Assonance to hyperbole (or hyper-bowl as they said) they failed at every opportunity.

Luckily my computer was nearby and in the dark I felt my headphones and plugged them in and fell asleep to Metallica's Ride the Lightning album.

I awoke to nature's call, stepped over the bodies to pee and walked to the living room to look at what seemed to be the aftermath of the epicenter of a grenade. People were sprawled over the couch, one another, and between the table legs. Many were still wearing their shoes. I went back to bed and woke up again around 11am to the sound of arguing.

Some part of me said, "They had questions about literary terms and the plural of octopus," and in my semiconscious state I marched out there and stood with purpose before them. They were all barely awake and with bleary eyes I said to them, " The plural of octopus is octopuses because it has a Greek suffix, conversely if it was octoped the Latin plural ending would be octoped rather than octopeduses." I had their full attention now. Apparently my subconscious recorded the literary terms they tried to define because after setting them straight in regards to octopuses I defined for them alliteration, assonance, palindrome, hyperbole, irony, sarcasm, sardonic and satire. Then I went back to bed. They were so dumbfounded that they didn't make another sound. Operation render them speechless was a complete success and I reaped the benefits with a much needed slumber.

Wow. Where did that all come from?

Gut Sickness

There is a feeling I get when I feel particularly ashamed of being human. A great example of this is something I glimpsed on the Reuters website.

2nd most popular article: Iran required to give up most of it's enriched uranium
1st most popular article: Donald Trumps's daughter, Ivanka, tweets new pregnancy.

UGH! Doesn't that make you sick? In what crazy world is Ivanka's pregnancy more important than Iran releasing it's enriched uranium? This one. My stomach gets upset and my face contorts to disgust.

After seeing that on the computer screen I had to physically remove myself from the room. I walked to the kitchen to get some water. In the living room some show was on about wedding dresses. Even now my stomach feels queasy. Ugh.

I will have to come back to this.

Back.

The wedding dress show is a reality show about people who buy wedding dresses. Problem customers, easy sales, and lots of money and a warehouse full of super expensive white fabric body coverings. But when I hear them talk up the wedding day as the single most important day of a woman's life (thought: of course they would talk up that day, they sell wedding dresses). Then the women parade around in front of their friends and family and try on various wedding gowns, gasp at the $10,000 price tag (or triple this in some cases) and pay it anyway saying, "Well I only get married once, might as well make it count."

Now before you think to yourself, "well actually lady, you will probably get married twice as the divorce rate is going up," I have to tell you that the divorce rate is going down, and has been going downward since the 60's. The current rate of divorce is about 41%, which I admit is rather high. But it has been decreasing. It's a oft-perpetuated lie that says otherwise. But accurate figures are seen when surveyed by legitimate institutions like the Fertility and Family Statistics branch of the Census Bureau and the Pew research center. Now, back to what I was saying.

These women buying these dresses for the price of a car that they will wear for a day...

I got nothing.

My brain simply does not compute. It does not make sense to me and I can't even wrap my mind around the idea of another person making that kind of decision: "It's the cost of new Honda Civic and I'll wear it once... but it is the most important day of my life, might as well make it count. I'll take it!"

You want to know the best part? Sometimes this expensive dress BANKRUPTS the women. Yeah. I know right? Imagine that post coital honeymoon conversation: "Wow. That was great -- by the way we are now fourteen thousand dollars in debt." BAZINGA!

I think the part that gets me is the frivolous spending of dump-trucks full of money on A dress and A celebration for A day. I see all of this, this industry, this institution and I think to myself... what a messed up place we live in. I understand far more than I am able to express, so I see these people and listen to the things they say and understand what kind of person they are, what they think about, how they think, what it must be like to live with them and so on.

Sometimes all I see when I look at this show is bipedal mammals acquiring white fabric at great cost to themselves and wear it one day in front of other bipedal mammals wearing expensive fabric so everyone can stand around and wear expensive fabric. It not unlike chimpanzees putting a leaf on their head starting a trend that others follow and they start revolving teir lives around acquiring said leaf, or something approximate. The sad thing is that the chimps know it is a game and drop it eventually.

Another day another update

It's been a really long time and a lot has happened.

After I busted my butt to write all those essays, and not to mention working when not applying to all of those grad schools, I just wanted to vegg out and decided to relax for a change.

Oh, it was so nice to not have responsibilities for a change. All I had to do was go to work. That left a lot of other time to do some mindless activities. So for the first time in three months I turned on the XBOX and played Forza Motorsport 3 and raced around in it. I must have done that for hours. While I'm racing in video game land my mind can wander and often does.

I feel like a huge weight just fell off my shoulders and I want to enjoy my carefree moment (however brief, because I know when the schools start responding to my requests I will be going back to school for a couple years and be very busy again, if I get accepted. So this may be the last good goof-off time I have for awhile.)

It was much needed after applying to grad school. I played other games, read some books and I even participated in some heavy-nerd activities!

One of my room mates has a girl friend, just recently she moved in with us (quartering the rent, wahoo!) and asked if I wanted to join them in a vampire/werewolf role playing table top game called the world of darkness. My initial reaction was negative, but deep below the surface of my psyche, my inner nerd stirred. I said maybe and slept on it. The next day a premise was posited to me from nowhere, insisting that because I had no obligations I could join them in the game, and if it wasn't fun it could be just the once. So I joined the game as a cage fighting, dumb tough guy that would, some how, transform into a werewolf at some time. We were playing humans first, and role playing the transformation for dramatic effect. (side note, vampires don't do anything for me; Werewolves on the other hand interest me quite a bit. I like the monster lurking beneath the surface idea, and prefer ferocious beast-type monsters to uppity, aristocratic, humanoids with pointy teeth and pale skin. However Bram Stoker's Dracula is a favorite story of mine, and the only book to scare me)

Anyway the role playing table top game was a lot of fun, but it reminded me of all the years I spent playing Dungeons and Dragons and others with my friends growing up. It made me very nostalgic because it was a favored weekend activity, and on several occasions it prevented my other friends from partaking in illegal activities like drug dealing. Role Playing Games satisfy some deep level of the psyche, something that can override desires to make money illegally, or go to parties or get drunk or a bunch of other things. Anyway, after the world of darkness game I started talking about Rifts, a futuristic role playing games with magic, robots, supernatural and stuff. They seemed interested so on a whim I offered to lead a game of Rifts for all of them to play in. They happily agreed and we played it the other night. It went pretty well, but it was all new to them so I had to lead them by the hand, so to speak and let them get a feel for the game mechanics. So now that that has been done, session # 2 will be a lot better, and after that it will be character driven.

Wow, what a nerdy outburst. I have to watch what my inner nerd says sometimes, he will talk forever, just to talk--which reminds me:

I saw some episodes of a show called Big Bang Theory about a bunch of nerd geniuses and a hot blond girl. I think it makes the obvious mistake with the stereotype about geniuses being unable to function socially, or with basic things like tying shoes and the like. I know plenty of brilliant people, some of them geniuses, and they are not socially awkward, quite the contrary, they are often speaking at huge public forums or writing formal papers. I realize that some people are awkward socially, and when they see girls and stuff, but the writers seem to go out of their way to make simple things complicated simply by inflating the language to chemistry or physics jargon. Sometimes it's cute, and sometimes it's annoying. Mainly because I understand and follow what they are saying in their complicated science talk.

That reminds me, I been watching a lot of the show Bones, and there are times when Bones will say something really complicated and Boothe doesn't understand what she says and says something like, "She, must have known him?" And Bones says, "Yeah, I just said that." I was watching it with some of my roommates friends, and it occurred to me that they are with Boothe and his inability to follow the science talk, and they have to wait for Boothe to 'translate' the science talk so they can understand it. I'm not trying to say I'm smart to brag or something, just observing that the two world perspectives we must have are vastly different.

Rambling now, time to go.